Piano Man
The was the nameless host of the Kraken Imagin in episodes 33 and 34 of Kamen Rider Den-O. History Past At some point, he was a well-known piano player; however, he suddenly retired around 1994. On January 18, 2004, he was playing a piano alone in a lot, when Yuki Okumura, himself an aspiring pianist, finds him. He recognizes the man him from his earlier career, and says that he had self doubts about his skills against the high expectations he faces, but the man's passionate playing just now has inspired him past them. The two became close, him becoming a mentor for Okumura. However, after Okumura finally made it into a piano concert, he is hit by a car while attempting to cross the street and tell the Piano Man the news. Present Day In the present, he is seen wandering around the city, silently moving his hands in front of him as if playing the piano. He stops at every open piano he finds, playing music until he is asked to leave. During one of these "performances", he is entered by the Kraken Imagin, which, when it presents itself, he asks simply for a piano. The Imagin quickly complies, stealing him a piano from a home, but the man insists that his wish hasn't been granted, and his memory doesn't open up a time door, much to the Imagin's frustration. Ryotaro arrives and fights the Imagin off, after which the man sits at the piano and starts playing. After Ryotaro tells him the Imagin will likely try again to complete its contract, he casually says he will simply wait again. The significance of the fact that his seemingly simple wish wasn't truly granted despite appearing to have been is not lost on Deneb. When tailing him earlier, Deneb had seen him standing outside a hospital, playing his "air piano" and staring up at a particular room, so Ryotaro and Yuto investigate, finding him there again. They learn the hospital room the man is staring at is where Okumura is, having been stuck in a coma since the accident, and that the Piano Man has been seen outside his room often, but never visited. Further investigation reveals that no one really knows who Piano Man is; they hear his piano, but don't know the man behind it. The Imagin steals another piano from a recording studio and brings it to him, this time delivering it to him outside the hospital. This time, he sits and begins to play even as Den-O Rod Form fights the Imagin, and the time door opens; his wish was to play the piano such that Okumura might hear him. Den-O follows it to the past, but upon its defeat it unleashes a swarm of Gigandeath Heavens and Gigandeath Hells, which begin rampaging and destroying the past; the Piano Man and Okumura, among many other people and buildings, disappear from the present. With the ZeroLiner's help, the DenLiner Taros engines destroy the Gigandeaths, the disappeared people and buildings returning, but not the Piano Man. As time is maintained by peoples' memories, Owner explains, and no one in the present save the comatose Okumura remembered him from the time the Imagin destroyed, he was not returned, having "spilled out of time"; this happens to someone or something during almost every Imagin rampage, and they are simply forgotten. However, at the DenLiner's next stop, the Piano Man boards with a ticket for January 18, 2004, the day he disappeared from; after spilling from time, people will travel on time trains until they are remembered, as the Piano Man will be if Okumura ever wakes. Notes *Much of the music that Piano Man plays is piano instrumentals of the insert theme Double-Action, and once of Action-ZERO, mildly breaking the fourth wall. Category:Kamen Rider Den-O Category:Contract holders